I've had my fair share of complaints about the game so far but since those can be mostly fixed, I'm waiting to see what will happen but there is one thing that made me not play for nearly two days now and once again I logged out nearly instantly today.

The social aspect. In short, it's a joke in Guild Wars 2.

Every map I enter I always try to start a chat in map chat or with anyone close to me which usually has no response whatsoever as a result. So then I try to join a guild, been in 12 so far, nobody talks even though I try to get any conversation going (sadly most of these guilds advertise themselves as social guilds on this forum too).

I love to do Jumping Puzzles in WvW as it gives free treb/golem blueprints which can contribute quite good towards our war against the other servers, been shouting in map chat on every borderland for 8 days now, never did anyone even want to respond except a few annoying trolls who feel it's neccesary to point out it's a warzone and not a PvE enviroment.

Same story for any other activity I try to do in the game.

I can deal with flawed mechanics which can be tuned but as far as I can tell, this is a flaw in the core of the entire design around Guild Wars 2. Since there is no difference between grouping and non-grouping, people avoid the social aspect entirely appareantly.

I never felt so lonely in a MMORPG. If this is the next generation of MMO's, I will be done with this genre.

Edit, I should note I have been on 4 servers now, all give me the same result.

Make it so that you have to manually aim your weapon or spells at your targets to hit them, no auto targeting. Well, make auto targeting optional, at least.

Exactly. And if such a switch existed, have it so that 60-80% of those damned deterministic dice rolls are turned off, so that I actually stand a chance against a bloody lynx that's some levels above my own. I would really love to have a 'skill vs. no skill' checkbox in the game. Add aiming, remove deterministic dice rolls. If they did that, sped up the combat, and lightened the restrictions upon dodge-rollling? I'd probably log in to GW2 to try it again tomorrow.

But the thing is is that they won't. And TERA already has all of that right now. Soooo...

I'd remove most of the deterministic dice rolls. So if you're good, you can go and take on a critter 40 levels above you and win, because you're good. Rather than being one-shotted because the opponent has more dice than you do. I'd also speed up combat by 2-4 times and I'd remove the endurance on dodge-rolls, just putting a 2-3 second cooldown on them. I'd also remove tab-targeting and I'd make it so that the only targeting can be done via a cursor reticle. I'd also add a reticle to the game for this purpose. I'd make combat more fun and skill-based.

This probably sounds like I'd want to turn it into TERA. Probably because I do. The combat of TERA is just far superior on every level.

Also, I tried Combat Mod for a bit but it's essentially TERA Ultra-Ultra-Ultra-Ultra-Ultra-Lite and as such it's absolutely no substitution for the real thing. What CM doesn't fix is that the combat is too damn slow, there are too many restrictions on dodging, and tab targeting exists (when it really shouldn't). Even Penny Arcade is with me on this point, and that's why I can't play GW2. As much as I enjoy the world, the slow combat and determinsitic dice rolls just kill me.

i would make every class have their own dots (like in WoW) and not share bleeds, poisons and burns. that's such a boring implementation of DoTs in theory, and a poorly designed execution of them in the game itself.

There were no monthly fees in GW1 yet end game was so much better than in GW2. I never got tired of doing UW and FoW. It was my way of having fun even though it was repetitive.

GW2 needs areas like UW/FOW/the deep etc. They were fun in their own way and kept you interested for ages.
That or some form of raids. Not actual raids, but something better than the lack luster dungeons in the game right now

I dont understand why people cant appreciate GW2 for what it is. Instead of complaining about what it isnt. In my eyes they created an MMO that is the most deserving of the title mmorpg.

The last 2 days ive been casually leveling my asura mesmer to level 15. And i have to tell you there isnt an MMO out there that has single zones that are so packed with lore and diverse content.

But all i see is people complaining about end game. Endgame Is a mechanic that creates a fake illusion of longetivity. If you look at wow endgame in its current state for example:

- Daily quests/rep grinds.
- Rated pvp where cheaters are condoned (seen the RBG ladders yet?) & non rated pvp that is dominated by bots.
- End game PvE that takes about 3 hours in total per week. So its literally grinding the same instance 20-25 times with a weekly interval.

Is that what you desire so much?

PvP in GW1 was basically the endgame, and it kept me playing for 7+ years.
GW2 has nothing going for it PvP-wise.
Yes I am aware there are going to be additions, but it's not just PvP modes that lack.
It's the whole skill and class setup that is so simplified, everyone plays the game exactly the same way.
There is no room for skill, where GW1 PvP was all about skill. Especially Mesmer, Ranger and Monk.

While this is true i hate that every armor as horribles clipping / texture issues if u try to mix them AND with every single weapon in the game (and i talk about humans, if we go watc charr or norn... lol) so many effort in the world so poor in our toons

Not to talk about the skill system and where the best Kiter wins... that's the skill? Kiting? please...

This game lacks EVERYTHING what I loved about GW1.
It was fun to play as a generic MMO, but got boring fast and won't play it again.
GW2 is messed up on so many levels, it can not pull me back with whatever Anet decides to put in.

Free to play, microtransaction, etc... regardless.. It's an MMO. I try hard to understand but I still can't wrap my head around why people leave the game complaining that there isn't anything to do and how GW2 end game is a disappointment. What did they expect?

If this was any other monthly fee MMO people would just be in the illusion that there is an end game while they grind for max level and incrementally small upgrades. Not saying that GW2 is free of that, in fact grinding for legendaries is ridiculously long. The grind exists in GW2 like any other MMO just that they made a lot of things easily accessible unlike other MMOs and also smartly hides a lot of things. People are leaving the game for the most obcure reasons as if they have to forcefully find negative critiques.

People disliking GW2? Haw is dis POSSIBRU!

Ok let's be honest. GW2 "eliminated" the grind for gear other games have as endgame (although I think this is gonna change in the future, ahem ascended...) BUT and is a BIG BUT(well that didn't sound quite right), Anet didn't susbtitute that with a WORTHY endgame. They thought that as dungeons adjust your level and you can visit any zone because of the same reason, that would be enough endgame. But they never wondered WHY THE HECK WOULD I RETURN TO ANY OTHER AREA if there is absolutely nothing new to do? WHY WOULD I REPEAT A DUNGEON 500 times if I'm not going to unlock anything or discover anything(why to repeat those plain simple dungeons btw, with a few excepions?)? The truth is that GW2 has only 1 endgame, to repeat those activities until your fingers bleed to get SUPER LEGENDARIES!!! And what do you do after getting a legendary? Ehm... uhm... Swing it?! Profit!!!

There is no challenge! Is only grind grind grind grind grind Bingo! you got your legendary now start another character and repeat, oh wait did you dual wield? * you! .
What did people expect? Something different! Something more creative! Heck idk! Not just the same shit as WoW. Because GW2 concept of endgame is just like WoW's only that WoW's takes 10x times more to achieve and you pay monthly like a fool.

Sad thing is, that kind of endgame is utter crap for many people (including me). That may be a reason to park the game. I personally left the PvE side of the game completely aside a looong time ago, now I only do PvP now and then cause I find it the only place to encounter some challenge.

On a personal level, the lack of an end-game isn't the worst thing that could happen. For instance, I spent thousands of hours in GW1 doing non-end-game content as my end-game. The game was super fun so I kept playing it. Heck, I loaded up GW1 yesterday, did Vizunah and it was a blast!
And that's what I am missing in GW2 - not an end-game, but rather a fun game.

Lets see what facts we can agree on first, before we submerge into fanboy vs troll antics.

There are fewer and fewer new players and more and more existing players are leaving.
The facts are the game is no longer a top seller. The facts are huge swaths of the game world are empty.
The facts are that most WvW mists rarely ever have ques to get in.

My take on why is that the MMO market is saturated while the potential player base is shrinking due to a bad economy and competition from other forms of entertainment.

Anet spent huge sums over a 5 year period hyping this game as the next big thing in MMO's. It even had a manifesto that claimed so many of the bugaboos of MMO's would not be there. No grind, No pay to win, cash shop cosmetics and convenience only, play your way, blah blah blah. This succeeded, GW2 sold a respectable several million copies out of the gate, but then players hit max level, and reported in forums the reality was not equal to the hype. There is grind, there is pay to win (gambling anyone?), The trinity was replaced with a twitchy zerg. Now that there is street information about what the game actually is, sales have fallen off.

No one wants to spend $60 for something they can get for free elsewhere. The market is flush with Asian grindy gambling free to play titles with just as glitzy graphics. You can argue about 'are legendaries a grind or pay to win' but the average potential new customer has seen these kind of schemes done over and over and can recognize them for what they are.

The people who buy the game level a character or two and then leave seem to be a majority, while a few find it to their liking and become true fans who cannot understand why the game is in decline. Every game out there has it's pollyanna fans who just wish everyone else would enjoy the game like they do. My perception is that GW2 simply does not cut it for enough people, they hype train is over, and it is now a question of how soon does it go free to play.

GW2 is sequel to GW1. They were making this game for 5 years, they should have known what their fans enjoyed the most in GW1, but they ignored that, they wanted to be more of a WoW type game with some "Inovations".
But then again, it's just my opinion. Perhaps most of the people do not enjoy complex games anymore, they just want to jump in and kill stuff.

Yes, I've done them all, and my total play time is only around 300 hours, which isn't all that much.
I could try grinding for legendary, but, not worth it, I personally find them all ugly, same as T3 armor for my main human. (Currently have around 130+ G and almost all maxed crafting levels)

You see, what I enjoyed the most about GW1's elite content wasn't the reward, it was the team play, my role - cleaning wastes in less than 10 minutes, chamber, vale, mountains, everyone in my team was relying on me to not to fail and be fast.

In GW2? Nothing. Fail as much as you want to, there's no punishment expect for repair costs. There are no real tactics, no real skill required, a player who has never played a dungeon before can simply join and be as good as the player next to him who has been playing this dungeon for the past month.

Yes, I'm not a hardcore player who spends 12 hours a day playing a game, but I prefer challenge over laughable and easy content.

I have 100% map, and I've no intentions to play another alt and grind the same zones for lvl 80 again.